Microwave Pulao in 20 minutes (with video)

I frequently get asked how to cook pulao, specifically, how to cook the Bengali style basanti pulao. I will be honest with you. I don’t cook pulao very often. Pulao, I think, is haughty and temperamental. It looks at the cook with disdain and judges them. If it doesn’t like what it sees, it sweats and clags and bursts into torrents of petulant foam.

I got a very early exposure to cooking pulao. It used to be a huge deal in my Kolkata home where, on birthdays and anniversaries, my mom and aunt would wash a huge handi of gobindobhog rice, coat it with ghee, salt, sugar, turmeric, and aromatic spices and then spread the rice over large cane mats for hours to dry, before cooking over low flame. This would be a 5-6 hour-long affair. I had the Bengali basanti pulao recipe memorized even before I had memorized the number 5 table. But I still don’t think pulao likes me very much. Because even when I do everything by the book, I don’t quite get the same results as my mother. I guess pulao and I don’t get along because I am temperamental too.

I have, however, figured out a much easier way to cook vegetable or peas pulao where I don’t have to confront the pulao. I like to cook vegetable pulao in the microwave. I have tried this recipe a hundred times and there have never been any problems.

For this vegetable pulao recipe, I don’t use any food coloring or turmeric, but you can as easily make a basanti pulao in the microwave. Just add yellow food color or turmeric to the soaked rice with the vegetables. You can also use any basanti pulao or vegetable pulao recipeand cook it in the microwave. You just have to follow the rice to water ratio rule and use the right time and heat settings and break the recipe into microwave friendly steps following this microwave pulao in 20 minutes recipe format.

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About me

Dhrubaa Mukherjee--An academic by profession, a contributor to Huffington Post, a dancer by passion, a compulsive foodie, a former flight attendant, and a constant traveler, I am, what they call, a transnational gourmand (gourmet?). I am not only fascinated by the tastes, colors, textures and aromas of food, I am equally intrigued by the histories, traditions and cultural inter-junctions that drive/influence recipes.